'Not a huge number of literary novels tackle the world of work… Out of rather unusual material Adrian Duncan has crafted a quiet, beautifully written, intellectually provocative and compelling story, an assured blend of mastery and mystery' Dublin Review of Books.

Paul, a young Irish engineer, follows Evelyn to Berlin and begins work on the renovation of a commercial building in Alexanderplatz. Wrestling with a new language, on a site running behind schedule, and with a relationship in flux, he becomes increasingly untethered.

Set against the structural evolution of a sprawling city, this meditation on language, memory and yearning is underpinned by the site's physical reality. As the narration explores the mind's fragile architecture, he begins to map his own strange geography through a series of notebooks, or 'Love notes'.

Paul's story will speak to anyone who has known what it is to be in love, or exiled, or simply alone.

A Sabbatical in Leipzig